Life In Urbanna Moves At Own Measured Pace

May 07, 1989|By BOB KEMPER Staff Writer

URBANNA — The BMW and the Chevy slowed as they pulled onto Cross Street.

On Saturday, everything slowed in Urbanna.

From the cars came men and women in shorts and khaki pants, sunglasses perched on their noses, sweaters draped over shoulders. They walked with the others, some with toddlers in tow, on the narrow sidewalks.

Slowly.

Some stopped and pulled up a seat on the shaded steps of the general store, a real general store where they keep rolls of brown wrapping paper on the counter, ready for customers' orders. They were chatting with neighbors, noting how much bigger everyone's kids were since the last time they saw them.

Then they'd get back up and walk. Slowly.

Because that's how life goes in small-town America on a day reminiscent of a summertime chat on the back porch. Slowly. And if there's one thing the Urbanna Folklore Festival was Saturday, it was a quiet celebration of the small town.

Local groups and people sold their clam chowder, hot dogs and homemade baked goods of every kind. The smell of cooking crab meat filled the air around the food stands.

Around the corner of the Old Courthouse yard, Joan Forrer led a blue-eyed pony named Blue around, toddlers on its back. Off to the side, Peanut the dog chased a stick.

For a dollar, the toddlers got to go around the yard and half-way back. Forrer had 23 riders in the first hour. The money will be used to fix the fire damage in the Old Courthouse, now home of the Middlesex County Woman's Club.

On the simple wooden stage down the street, Indian tribal dancers, wearing what had to be some of the warmest clothes on the festival route, finished a ceremonial dance and made way for the square dancers.

As dancers pulled members of the audience up to grind the parking lot's gravel under uncertain feet, the rock band's pickup trucks backed in. Members of the group started to unload their gear, ready to be the next act in the something-for-everyone lineup.

There were a couple of hundred people, a trickle compared to the flood that filled those same streets for the Oyster Festival last fall.

The Folklore Festival has only been around two years, started by the Urbanna Chamber of Commerce after Rappahannock Community College decided to stop having the Dragon Run Folklife Festival.

And it has a pace of its own.

Besides, one vendor noted, it's not necessarily the quantity of people, but the quality.

"That's what makes these things - the people," said Paul Reid, of Goochland County.

Reid's mobile home was pulled to the side of the gravel lot along Virginia Street, its canopy extended over a table of statues, hats and T-shirts.

"When you're out in a place like this, you have to have a little bit of everything," said Reid, who has been traveling to small-town festivals around the state for about three years. "You hope to pick up a dollar here and a dollar there. And you get to meet some of the nicest people here."

Next to him was Sandra Barefoot, who sells antiques while Reid sells T-shirts.

Although the mid-afternoon sky was still mostly blue, Barefoot and Reid had boxes of umbrellas, rain hats and ponchos at the ready. Rain was predicted, and if the weather behaved as it did for the Oyster Festival last year, the rain gear would sell well.

"That's a sure-fire way to make sure it doesn't rain - have them on hand," Barefoot said.